Archive for July 2010

Mr. Denton receives the Bible signed by all mission team members.Team members laid hands on the new home and offered prayers of blessing.

Bargersville, Seventeen members of Providence Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), Bargersville, completed a mission trip to Jamaica from July 3 – 10. Mark Boehnlein, youth pastor, and his wife, Roni, were mission leaders for the 12 youth and 5 adults who went on the trip. The team worked out of the beautiful CSI Ministries Mission Guest House in Highgate, St. Mary Parish, Jamaica.

The team divided into two work teams and had four mission assignments. The workers built a home up in the Blue Mountains for Mr. Denton, who worked alongside the group. When the house was completed, all team members and missionaries joined with neighbors at the house for a spiritually moving dedication. In addition to the keys to the house, Mr. Denton received a Bible and craft items for his home. The service concluded with everyone laying hands on the house and prayers of blessing were spoken.

The missionaries also helped CSI Jamaican workers in the building of a block and stucco farm depot. Shelly Smith, adult team member, supervised the Providence workers on this project, which is part of the new R.A.I.S.E. (Restoring Agriculture and Investing in Sustainable Enterprise). This project is turning 193 new CSI acres into teaching Jamaicans how to sustain themselves into crop production, poultry, green house industries, aquaculture, and other trades. A university and also a technical institute will be putting campus extensions on the grounds.

Team members laid hands on the new home and offered prayers of blessing.

The Disciples also gained experience clearing brush from the rich jungle acres using machetes for use in sustainable farming. The final project was a half day spent painting at an office complex on the mission grounds.

The team also experienced swimming at Jack’s Bay Beach, an afternoon and evening on Greencastle Plantation, an evening in Highgate for local ice cream and a tour of the Clonmel Potters.

CSI Ministries has international headquarters in Muncie, Indiana. Ronn Oren, former pastor at Trafalgar Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) is the Executive Director. In the past two decades, CSI has built around 600 small homes for Jamaicans.

Submitted by Steven Sorensen, Senior Pastor of Providence Christian Church

Indianapolis, The GIDA (Greater Indianapolis Disciples Area) is organizing a panel build with St. John’s United Christian Church, located at 7031 South East Street. The panel build will take place, rain or shine, on Saturday, September 18, 2010, from 7:30 am until 12:00 pm.

Walls of a Habitat home will be put together and erected on the parking lot of the church, and volunteers can walk through and see the shell of the house once building is complete. Builders can write messages on the panels for the new home owner to see before the walls are taken down and moved to be erected again on-site.

Eighty people will be needed to complete the build, with 40 working the first 2-hour shift and 40 working the second 2-hour shift. All supplies and water will be provided, but volunteers are encouraged to bring knee pads if needed. All participants must be 16-years-old or older and need to sign a release form.

Please contact Sheila Carlson directly at Indy Habitat at scarlson@indyhabitat.org or 921-2121, ext. 117 to volunteer or to get more information.

The Division of Overseas Ministries and Global Ministries will host a luncheon on Wednesday, August 11, 2010 at 12:15pm in the Disciples Center. Summer Seminary Interns from the Division of Overseas Ministries will speak on their recent trip to Zimbabwe, Swaziland and South Africa.

The luncheon will be in the Lower Level Conference Room at the Disciple Center, 130 East Washington Street, Indianapolis, Indiana, from 12:15 – 1:00 p.m. Parking will be validated by the Disciples Center and is available at the Huntington Plaza Parking garage on the east side of Pennsylvania, between Market and Washington Streets.

Please RSVP to Elizabeth Carrasquillo at elizabethc@dom.disciples.org or call 317-713-2576 no later than Monday, August 9.

Southport Christian Church, Indianapolis Southport Christian Church is preparing a worship series modeled after an old radio show format. Every Sunday morning beginning August 1, worship will include a guest artist, house band, old fashioned hymn singing, a Reader’s Theater, sponsor (fictional), a message from the Front Porch, as well as communion.

The first Sunday guest artist is Buddy Jewell, winner of the first Nashville Star, and current country/gospel recording artist.

Planners at Southport hope the series will invite people to reconnect with their own faith journey and to help them understand that even in the most mundane parts of life, God is present. The service will engage people where they are in their own daily existence through the use of shared experiences and stories with a lesson.

The four services, starting on Sunday August 1st, will begin at 10:00 a.m. and will move each week through the four seasons of the year beginning with summer.

Allisonville Christian Church, Indianapolis, TICKETS ARE ON SALE NOW FOR THE CONCERT BENEFITTING THE HAITI MISSION GROUP, Saturday, July 24, 2010 at 7pm. Laura Hall Concert

Allisonville Christian Church invites you to an entertaining and inspiring evening, featuring the original music of Laura Hall (Whose Line is it Anyway?), and the engaging storytelling of Rick Hall (The Middle, 24, and countless commercials). This family friendly event promises to be both uplifting and fun! Proceeds from this concert will help to fund an earthquake relief trip to Haiti in February.

Sixteen members of Allisonville Christian Church were scheduled to visit Haiti in January of 2010. Unfortunately the earthquake of January 12 changed everything. Given the new reality of post-earthquake Haiti, Allisonville has postponed their journey to February 5-12, 2011. The focus of the journey has changed as well. CONASPEH, the National Council of Spiritual Church of Haiti, one the partner churches of the Disciples of Christ and the United Church of Christ, has requested that groups coming in 2011 have skills to help in the reconstruction effort. All groups will be led by Haitian masons and will work under their instruction. All reconstruction buildings will be of one level with additional steel infrastructure to secure the building further. Allisonville Christian Church also sees their physical accompaniment as an essential part of the spiritual rebuilding of Haiti. It will be important to demonstrate to our sisters and brothers in Haiti that they are not alone and that the wider body of Christ is in solidarity with them in this challenging time in their history.

For more information and ticket purchase, please call the church office at 317-849-3957.

First Christian Church of Noblesville and Coppin Chapel A.M.E. in Indianapolis held a shared seven-week Bible study on “Radical Hospitality.” The study was attended by members of both churches and led both congregations to a celebration of Pentecost Sunday.

According to John Davis, pastor to First Christian Church, “We thought Pentecost would be an especially good time to recognize the diversity and unity of all Christians.”

One week the study was held at First Christian in Noblesville and Brigitte Black, pastor to Coppin Chapel, would teach. The following week the study would be held in Indianapolis at Coppin Chapel with Davis teaching. The average weekly attendance was 25 people.

During that time First Christian Church launched a fund raising drive to benefit the Summer Enrichment Program that Coppin Chapel conducts for five weeks each summer. The goal of the Summer Enrichment Program is to help disadvantaged children in one of the most impoverished and crime ridden neighborhoods in Indianapolis get a jump on the school year and have a safe place to go for five weeks.

First Christian’s goal was $15,000, enough to feed each of the 100 attendees two meals per day for five weeks. First Christian Church currently has an average attendance of 170.

On Pentecost Sunday, May 23, the two churches gathered for a joint service and pitch in dinner. On that day First Christian presented Coppin Chapel with a check for $16,800.

First Christian and Coppin Chapel plan to continue working, studying and serving together, including repeating a shared Bible study and Pentecost celebration in 2011.